Chapter 11

The next morning Jarah sat propped against the headboard of her bed, looking at the sun coming up. She barely slept at all. Her mind just wouldn't settle down and was racing in circles. Daryl's outburst replaying over and over in her head. She knew that Daryl was right. She had been hiding in the house instead of dealing with the women like a grown up, but hiding was so much easier than having to face memories of her mother every time she talked to them. She would have to fight every day to even get out of bed and leave the room now and after a sleepless night like the last, she felt too weak to fight.

Her gaze shot to the door as she heard a light knock. She got up and opened the door quietly, meeting those beautiful blue eyes she had missed looking into last night. Daryl quickly averted his gaze and spoke quietly in order to not wake up the kid.

"Hey."

"Hey,..." Jarah replied just as quiet, waiting for him to go on.

"Got a minute?" he asked, still not looking at her.

"Yeah, come in." Jarah walked back to the bed. Daryl groaned inwardly. She was wearing the tiniest sleeping shorts he had ever seen. She might be tiny, but her legs went on for miles. He wanted to run his hands along the sun-kissed skin, part her legs and kiss every inch of those thighs, right up to her...

"So? What can I help you with?" Daryl was pulled from his thoughts by her tired voice. She sat on the edge of the bed and looked at him expectantly.

Daryl closed the door behind him and leaned back against it, eyes back on the floor.

"I'm sorry 'bout what happened last night. Feel like shit for yelling in front of the little dude." he admitted.

"It's okay,... I forgive you for that,... just don't do it again. Thank god he was asleep this time, don't want him to be scared of you. But what you said,..."

"Wasn't right,... you're not a coward. You got your reasons,... I just don't get it,..." Daryl interrupted her. He tried to understand why she wouldn't want to be around the women of the group at all. As far as he could tell, they had never done or said anything bad to her. He wanted her included in the group, so he could rightfully take her and her son with him, should they ever have to leave now.

"I know,... How can I be afraid of people I don't even know, right? I don't know how to explain it. They just remind me of my mother and that's bad. I call them 'dominant women'. Queen bees. Selfish, opportunistic, think they're right all the time, even though they're not. They just trigger so many bad memories... There is still so much about each other we don't know Daryl. I feel like I've known you forever, but we've barely talked. All I know about you is your name, you're hot, a great kisser and that you're a guy with a good heart." Jarah explained.

Daryl's eyes shot up at the last part and he had to fight a smirk. They weren't back to teasing each other yet, there were other things they had to talk about first. He would keep her words in mind for later though.

"Tell me something about your mom, then. I just wanna understand." Daryl told her.

Jarah sighed and wrapped her arms around her chest. She hated going back there, but like Carol said, she had to make an effort. "She was evil,... truly evil in my eyes. The kind of person to push you down the stairs to make you break your neck if she got something good out of it. Every time a mother should protect her child, support it, have its back, she would be the one to push me in the line of fire, so to speak. She didn't want me, told me she hated me every day. She had these outbursts, she would just go ballistic at the littlest thing. She hit me with my school books, just beat me with them all the while yelling about stuff I wasn't to blame for..., but I never had a single mark on me unfortunately, so nobody would have ever believed me. Nobody believed that she was a horrible person either. It was creepy, she had two faces. She was the devil with me, as soon as the doorbell rang or in public if another person came by she would suddenly smile and laugh so big,... it was scary. Sometimes she would start telling me how worthless I was, how much of a failure, how I couldn't do anything right etc, and she wouldn't stop until I was crying so hard that I had to throw up. If she didn't want to see me for a couple of weeks, she would lie to my dad, tell him I did something wrong so I would get punished and wouldn't be allowed out of my room except for school. Well, that's pretty much all you need to know. The basics. There is so much more she did over the years, but that's it in a nutshell, Daryl."

"And your Dad? He hit you, too?" he asked. He knew firsthand what it felt like to be treated like shit by their own parents.

"No, my Dad never laid a finger on me. He was more into yelling and putting pressure on me. Punishing me for what he thought were mistakes and bad grades. To be liked by my dad you had to be two things. Number 1: You had to be beautiful, but the only beautiful people in his eyes were blondes with blue eyes and killer bodies. Number 2: You had to be the best... in school, at your job, sports, whatever. Wanted me to be popular, but I wasn't. I was the weird kid with the huge bug eyes that had to be home by six, even when I was 16. As a kid, if I got invited to a birthday party, my dad would call the parents of the kid and had them send me home, before the party really started. I wasn't allowed to eat at other people's houses. Nobody was allowed to eat with us at our house. Said he wasn't working to feed other people's kids, so he wasn't expecting other people to do the same with me. Other parents felt sorry for me, I could see it in their eyes, the pity, but there was nothing they could do. Still they didn't want their children to have too much to do with me and my family." Jarah had started crying while she went through her memories. That was one part of her childhood that really hurt her the most, "I stopped celebrating my own birthday when I was 13,... made no sense to do it anymore. Nobody wanted to come anyway, knowing they would be send home again. Until I had Jamie I always thought, that I really was to blame for all they did to me. That I was a horrible child. Now I know that I wasn't. I look at him and keep thinking 'how can parents do that stuff to their own child?' They were just sick sick people. Dissatisfied, unhappy, sick people."

Daryl reached over and placed his hand on hers, squeezing lightly. "I'm sorry."

"Me, too,... for what you had to go through!", Jarah whispered.

Daryl looked at her confused, but then remembered that she had tended to his wounds the day he fell down the ravine. She had seen the scars.

"I'm not expecting you to tell me in exchange for my story." she quickly added.

"I know,... my old man was a lot like your mom. Just used belts instead of books. Let's leave it at that."

"Guess we have more in common than we ever thought we would." Jarah sighed, her gaze drawn to Jamie's bed. He was starting to wake up.

Daryl nodded. "I know it's gonna be tough, but you'll have to fight, Jar. Face your fear with everybody now living under the same roof. I'll have your back. Andrea is not that bad, just putting up a front,... Just try to avoid Lori. And Shane. Don't want that asshole near the two of you."

Jarah snorted. "Think I want him around us? Have you seen his eyes? Those are serious crazy eyes. He's going off the deep end. One of these days he is gonna run amok and I'm sure Rick is the first on his kill list."

"How do you know all that, you haven't been around them." Daryl was surprised.

"Told you I was a careful person. I watch people, too you know. I watched him a couple of times. Shane, I mean. Saw him whispering with Lori, the looks he gave her and the ones he shot Rick... Doesn't take a genius to figure out what's going on. He thinks that baby is his and that Rick is in the way, can't protect them. What he doesn't know yet is that he won't have to fight Rick for Lori."

"What do you mean?"

"Lori's not gonna make it, Daryl. Told you pregnancy and zombie apocalypse don't mix well. She's either gonna bite the dust in the next couple months during the pregnancy or during giving birth. She had a C-section with Carl, that means she will very probably need one again. Who's gonna do that? Hershel's a vet and we don't have what we need to do that kind of procedure. She's a goner, it's just a matter of time. There's so much that can go wrong in those 9 months." Jarah explained matter-of-factly.

"Guess you're right." he watched her greet Jamie and get him out of his bed. The little dude was already smiling and babbling happily. Jarah sat back down with him on her lap next to Daryl and the hunter was surprised, when Jamie reached out his arms towards him.

"Oh, I guess he wants to be on your lap. Is that okay?" Jarah asked carefully.

"Yeah sure, come here little fella. Man you're happy in the mornings, huh?" Daryl smiled at him and thought 'Well guess I'd be happy too if I'd wake up next to your momma.'

"Yeah most of the time he is. Watch your facial hair, he is fascinated with it and loves to pull on it." Jarah warned and sure enough not two seconds later he felt a tug on his chin and heard Jamie squealing in delight. It made Daryl smile even more. The little one was kind of cool, he could get used to having him around. He thought about what Jarah had said earlier. How she looked at Jamie and couldn't imagine doing the things to him her parents did. Looking at him now, Daryl felt the same and he also felt a fierce sense of protectiveness.

"I'll get him some milk, he is thirsty as hell in the mornings. Is it okay if I leave him with you for a couple of minutes?" Jarah was pulling on a pair of sweatpants over her sleeping shorts while asking him.

"No problem, we're doing fine over here", Daryl responded and let Jamie explore his face with his tiny hands. Jarah left and Daryl smiled again as Jamie leaned his forehead against Daryl's and looked into his eyes giggling. 'What kind of sick fucks would hurt an innocent child like this and make them unhappy for the rest of their lives?' Daryl thought again. He instinctively tickled Jamie's ribs, having seen Jarah do that a couple of times, and got him to giggle even more.

"I'm gonna help your momma protect you. I'll protect both of you. You just gotta convince your stubborn momma to let me. She likes doing things alone, but she doesn't have to do that anymore." Daryl murmured.

Seconds later Jarah came back with Jamie's sippy cup. Jamie plopped down on Daryl's lap and leaned back against the hunter's chest and started drinking greedily. Darly felt a little proud that Jamie stayed with him instead of reaching for his mother as soon as she got back. Jarah watched them, smiling silently.

"So... we good?" Daryl broke the silence.

"Yeah, we're good!" Jarah smiled and squeezed his hand once.

Daryl started smirking. "So all you know about me is that I'm hot and a good kisser?"

"I KNEW it!" Jarah laughed, slapping his arm. "I knew that would come back to bite me in the ass. But seriously, yeah there's not much more I know about you. I don't know how old you are for example."

"I'm 38."

"I figured it was something between 37 and 40. You got the skin of a 25 year old, though. I'm envious." Jarah laughed.

"The hell is that supposed to mean?" Daryl looked at her like she was insane.

"Means you got great skin. Makes you look younger." Jarah explained.

"Women... " Daryl scoffed and shook his head.

They kept talking for a while, He kept her company while she washed and dressed Jamie. Told her a bit about Merle and their hunting trips together.

When he was about to leave because she wanted to get dressed, she stopped him. She took his hand and pulled him a bit closer and bit her bottom lip.

"Soooo,... are you gonna move into the house now, too?"

"Don't know,... kinda like my space out there. Why? You want me to?" Daryl asked her, wanting to hear her say it.

"I'd like that, yeah... You could be our roommate. A bed could be nice for a change. It's big enough for the both of us and we're both adults, we can sleep in one bed. Jamie sleeps like a rock at night, he won't bother you. What do you say?"

"I'll be moved in by tonight." Jarah grinned like a fool when he said that and placed a quick kiss on his chest. "Gotta go now, gotta talk to Rick about something. I'll see you later..."

But he wasn't leaving. He was standing there chewing on his bottom lip, while staring at her mouth, wanting to kiss her again, but not sure if she wanted that now.

Jarah got the hint and leaned up and kissed him softly. "See ya!"

Daryl nodded and quickly left, but Jarah still managed to catch a glimpse of his reddened cheeks. Without their liquid courage they were still a little awkward about the kissing.

Jarah watched his retreating back for a moment, before she forced herself to get changed. It was time for her to spend some time with the group.

Whew, that was a tough one for me to write. Cried my way halfway through it. Now listen, I really need your help, guys and dolls. I am thinking of some scenarios of where to take the story in the future and there is always one thing that is kind of in the way. I am in a dilemma here, I don't want you to hate me, but I think in order to move this story forward, I will have to remove little Jamie from their universe. I feel so bad just writing that, I could scream, but I want to keep the story going for a while and keep it interesting and he might keep me from doing that. Please give me your opinion on this. Send me a PM guys, really need some feedback on that one.

Thanks for reading!